Fred Luthans is the George Holmes University Distinguished Professor of Management at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln.
He received his B.A., M.B.A., and Ph.D. from the University of Iowa and did some postdoctoral work at Columbia University. While serving in the armed forces, he taught at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. He has been at the University of Nebraska since 1967, his entire academic career, and won the distinguished teaching award in 1986 and the excellence in graduate education award in 2000.
A prolific writer, he has published a number of major books and about 150 articles in applied and academic journals. His book, Organizational Behavior Modification, coauthored with Robert Kreitner, won the American Society of Personnel Administration award for the outstanding contribution to human resources management, and a more recent book titled Real Managers is the result of a four-year research study that observed managers in their natural settings. He has the first mainstream text in Organizational Behavior now in its 11th edition. International Management, coauthored with Richard Hodgetts and Jonathan Doh, is now in its sixth edition. His two most recent books (co-authored with Bruce Avolio) are The High Impact Leader (McGraw-Hill) and Psychological Capital (Oxford University Press). His articles are widely cited and reprinted and have brought him the American Society of Hospital Administration award.
The co-editor-in-chief of the Journal of World Business, Professor Luthans is also the editor for Organizational Dynamics and the Journal of Leadership and Organization Studies and is on the editorial board of several other journals. He has been very active in the Academy of Management over the years and was elected a Fellow in 1981. He is a former president of the Midwest Region. He was vice president, program chair of the National Academy meeting in 1984, and in 1986 was elected president of the Academy. In 1997, Professor Luthans received the Academy's Distinguished Educator Award. In 2000 he became an inaugural member of the Academy's Hall of Fame for being one of the "Top Five" all-time published authors in the prestigious Academy journals, AMJ and AMR. Also active in the Decision Sciences Institute (DSI), he was elected a Fellow in 1987.
Professor Luthans has a very extensive research program at the University of Nebraska. For example, his theory and research on positive reinforcement has been found, in a published article, to be one of the six most influential in the field of organizational behavior. Most recently, his studies have focused on his seminal work on positive organizational behavior and psychological capital (PsyCap). Published in the top research journals, these studies have demonstrated that PsyCap predicts performance and job satisfaction and can be developed. Luthans has been a visiting scholar at a number of universities in the United States and has lectured at universities and conducted workshops for managers in many countries around the world. Most recently, he has been actively involved in the former East Germany, Russia, China, and in a U.S. A.I.D. program conducted in Albania and Macedonia. In addition, he has been on the Executive Committee of the annual Pan Pacific Conference since its beginning in 1984 and in 1995 was elected a Fellow. This international research and experience is reflected in his approach to the field of organizational behavior and leadership.
In addition, he is an active consultant and trainer to both private- (such as Wal-Mart and Ameritas Life Insurance, Inc.) and public-sector (such as the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association) organizations. Since 1998 he has been a Senior Research Scientist with Gallup.
International Management: Culture, Strategy, and Behavior 5th Ed.